As ever, once my initialt excitement wore off I am increasingly finding myself agreeing with Lorn and Lordprinceps - I don't want the DD to change so much that you could churn them out via a robotic stat generator (they need to remain interesting and unique) - but there are definately some tweaks needed to some.

Given the speed at which the Centurion was nerfed I can't see the Incubus or Kiev reaching the table in their current forms (2 weeks until physical launch).

Kiev I like the concept of. However it has BB guns on a DD. That should tax its generators. Reduce attacks to 1 but up Fusilade to 2. Drop armour back to 4+. Now you have a great WF efficient ship able to really hunt but requiring clever play not to lose.

PHR need some work IMHO. Electra sits well enough and is an example of a well balanced ship IMHO. Ariadne is interesting and will be curious to see how they stack up against troopships.

The Jason for PHR is harder to fix. I think D3+2 and swarmer would work perfectly. With its small signature and the heavy calibres for the approach. Still fragile but D3+2 and swarmer on the CAW will make them more reliable anti-atmosphere weapons or indeed assault weapons.

Brutoni wrote:The Jason for PHR is harder to fix. I think D3+2 and swarmer would work perfectly. With its small signature and the heavy calibres for the approach. Still fragile but D3+2 and swarmer on the CAW will make them more reliable anti-atmosphere weapons or indeed assault weapons.

Thoughts?

I've suggested D3+2 as an absolute minimum but I can't comment on Swarmer as I've not seen that rule!

Swarmer requires one more PD hit to negate a hit or crit. So instead of 1 Hit for a Hit and 2 for a Crit you need 2/3. See page. 68 of the rulebook.

I think that this is a decent idea for a minimum, though I think the anti-atmoshperic destroyers should be better then Corvettes at taking out Strike Carriers, for two reasons. First they themselves are easier targets for the enemy, in particular if they have to get close as a close action ship has to, second the Corvettes need a buff in their Strike Carrier killing role so using a underpowered system as a baseline will cause issues.

This is not easier due to the decision to only give 2 factions this ability, for whatever reason and both ships in question also can use their weapons against orbital targets just fine. Which I think is a serious game design flaw. As it limits their effectiveness in the anti-atmospheric role if they are not supposed to become too effective outside of it. The Kiev is a good example as it´s damage is not that much of an issue if it could only apply it to atmospheric ships but as it an apply it everywhere it is an issue.

Personally, it makes no sense that it'd get SLOWER with more engines on it, and that armor would be increase rather than hull from all its extra mass. At the risk of it being "boring", it being a direct intermediate between destroyers and light cruisers makes far more sense. Likewise, its points should reflect this too; from looking at the rest of the destroyers, it appears that their baseline really should be around 60 points save for the two specialists (Havana and Cobalt), and baseline for light cruisers is 85 or so.

Leave the weapon as it is; as much as I knee-jerked upon initially seeing it, at a higher price point it meets all of my personal checkmarks. Two of these changed Kievs still come out highly efficient in terms of firepower, but they're actually somewhat significant of an investment (a group of 2 sitting neatly in cost between a regular cruiser and a heavy cruiser), and 4+ armor makes them just that more vulnerable to reprisal from more sources, balanced out by the extra 1 hull. I.E., they can tank a little bit more damage, but now 4+ and 5+ lock weapons are somewhat threatening to them as well.

SuccubusI feel like there was a somewhat missed opportunity in regards to the Scourge having an atmospheric weapon of some kind, and the Succubus looks like a perfect opportunity for that.

"The dense cluster of Oculus weapons at the Succubus' prow allows it to generate a frightfully powerful blast of energy, phased to where it can outright burn through a significant distance of atmosphere without losing overall accuracy or cohesion"

It's still frightfully powerful for a destroyer, but its standard orders firepower from its beam has been reduced by about .5 damage for both its wide and narrow focus, and in exchange, its guns have gained .5 damage. Just as powerful in overall damage, but it's less of a "Scourgeified New Cairo"

As it was, the Revenant was effectively a bigger, slower Djinn with some launch assets on the side, unlike the "jack-of-all-trades" ship it's implied to be, unusual for the Scourge except on their biggest ships. The problem, of course, is that it was decidedly inefficient for this. It had nonexistent guns, CAW no better than the Djinns in exchange for better hull and armor, but worse sig and thrust, and its launch capacity is exceedingly mediocre on top of it all. I could take take a Hydra and three Djinns for about 30 points more, and end up not only with the same CAW firepower (with 3/4 of it being on faster hulls), but superior gun firepower and superior launch assets, all for the same strategic rating.

Downgrading the CAW and upgrading the beam, all while making it just a touch cheaper, makes it a solid jack-of-all-trades ship. No single one of its weapon systems can kill a frigate on their own, but any two combined likely will, giving a full squadron of them a lot of proper ways to bring down targets instead of "rush into scan range like a bigger Djinn"

Lorn wrote:Swarmer requires one more PD hit to negate a hit or crit. So instead of 1 Hit for a Hit and 2 for a Crit you need 2/3. See page. 68 of the rulebook.

I think that this is a decent idea for a minimum, though I think the anti-atmoshperic destroyers should be better then Corvettes at taking out Strike Carriers, for two reasons. First they themselves are easier targets for the enemy, in particular if they have to get close as a close action ship has to, second the Corvettes need a buff in their Strike Carrier killing role so using a underpowered system as a baseline will cause issues.

This is not easier due to the decision to only give 2 factions this ability, for whatever reason and both ships in question also can use their weapons against orbital targets just fine. Which I think is a serious game design flaw. As it limits their effectiveness in the anti-atmospheric role if they are not supposed to become too effective outside of it. The Kiev is a good example as it´s damage is not that much of an issue if it could only apply it to atmospheric ships but as it an apply it everywhere it is an issue.

I've since found Swarmer and fully agree, though I think the Kingfisher missiles would still need extra attacks due to Armour Saves. If an Anti-Atmo Destroyer can't reliably destroy one Strike Carrier per attack, something is amiss